Earth 0.
The first and only thing Cisco notices is the perfect, unbroken darkness.
Let there be light, he thinks with a wry smile.
He takes one step and a weird snuffling noise near his foot raises every hair on his arms. Without warning, a clammy hand grabs his sleeve.
He takes off, howling like a banshee.
"Hm," grunts the Martian, listening to the fading screaming in the distance, "rude."
1.
Cisco tumbles into a monochromatic living room. The grayscale family of three seated on a plush couch look up from an old timey television set.
"Um." Cisco lifts a hand in a wave. "Hi. You're not the Earthlings I'm looking for."
"Honey," the bewildered matriarch says, her two youngsters eyeing Cisco curiously, "there's a man in our living room."
A second woman appears around the corner, scowls, and points to his shoes. They're dripping black ash onto an otherwise immaculate gray carpet. Oops.
Cisco smiles sheepishly, his face blushing slate-grey as he scrubs them belatedly on a floor mat. "I'll just be –" He gestures vaguely over his shoulder.
"What's your shirt say?" the older kid, pushing twelve, asks.
Cisco glances down and grins. HAN SHOT FIRST. "You ever heard of Star Wars?"
Matriarch one frowns and tugs her youngest, maybe three, onto her lap. "Don't scare the children; those were centuries ago," she says.
"Was there a Princess Leia?" he asks, unable to help himself.
"Is the sky grey?" Matriarch two quips sarcastically.
Cisco grins and vanishes.
2.
A polar bear whuffs a great inhale, towering over him.
Wedged in a shallow crevice underneath it, Cisco tenses.
Please don't eat me, he entreats. I do not taste like chicken.
The bear leans in, black nose pressing against Cisco's chest, and Cisco thinks, Here lies Francisco Ramon, Idiot Extraordinaire. Saliva drips on his shirt, hot and hungry. Closing his eyes, Cisco clamps his jaw shut and braces himself for impact.
The bear sneezes.
Cisco scrambles out of his nook and into another dimension.
3.
Cisco isn't expecting the crash of cold – breathtakingly cold – water, but he takes the polar plunge with a cut-off shout.
He tries to push to the surface but sinks with alarming rapidity, sunlight and safety retreating above him as his lungs scream for air. No matter how much he flails, he can't find traction – he's too heavy, his surroundings are too light – when a pair of – arms? – comes up under his and fwoom.
With dolphin-like enthusiasm, he's propelled to the surface, gasping for air as his rescuer keeps their arms under his. "You're a terrible swimmer," she muses. Then something huge and distinctly tail-like brushes his foot, and oh, wow. Mermaid.
"You're – wow."
The mermaid squints. "You new?" she asks. She lets him go, evidently presuming he can at least float, and Cisco drops out of sight. Effortlessly, she dives down, sweeps under him, and pushes him back up to the surface.
Cisco coughs, a strange metallic aftertaste on his tongue. "Thank you," he huffs. Then, insatiably, he asks, "Are you a mermaid?"
She narrows her eyes. "Do I look like a mermaid?"
Yes.
"No?"
She rolls her eyes, lets him go, and together they slip out of sight. A second later, flippers – flippers – push him to the surface. A harp seal's unimpressed stare is his response.
"Holy shit," is all he can say.
She drops him and he sinks. Frantically, he focuses and opens a portal, dropping through it before he can add drowned by selkie to his obituary.
4.
He flops onto a pier with graceless momentum, oofing loudly.
The crash of shouts and sailors' boots is almost overwhelming, pressing in on all sides. It's a fish market, Cisco reflects dazedly. And he's the fish.
A man seizes him by the back of the collar and hoists him into the air like he was there the whole time. He shouts, "Fine specimen! Mint condition! Won't accept a penny under five hundred!" Theoretically, that is: the actual words are an inaudible stream of consonants, ground together in a gravelly tone as bystanders bid energetically.
Someone stuffs a wad of crumpled cash into the man's hands – Cisco catches an image of a monarch he doesn't recognize on the front of several bills – and snags the front of his shirt, slipping a rope around his neck and dragging him off.
He's not the only one, he realizes, caught in a growing chain of lowered heads, bare feet shuffling across the deck.
Time to go, Cisco decides, reaching for the rope at the same moment a whip lashes at him, plunging into a portal as its crack echoes behind him.
5.
They're singing.
He turns in a slow circle under a galaxy of stars, searching for the sound. A full-throated, joyous melody repeats, seemingly endlessly, across a desert he doesn't recognize, a song he doesn't know. He can hear the shaking of leaves above the hush of the empty space, rhythmic clapping helping the song build, hoots and howls punctuating it with electrifying ease.
Intoxicated, he takes off his shoes, abandoning them to that other world and running bare-footed across the still-warm sand. The sound of human voices draw him towards a dark horizon. There are mountains on the edge of his sightline, and he thinks, You'll never make it, but he doesn't care.
It's a gorgeous, irresistible sound, and the longer he runs the more he wants to run, the more it builds into his chest until he has to stop so he can let out a howl of joy. The strangers catch it and volley back a chorus of their own awh-awh-awhooooos, encouraging him, calling him home, and he's singing it with every fiber of his being, I'm here, I'm here, I'm here.
There's laughter, clapping, an exchange of souls under a perfect night sky, utterly unbreakable. He thinks, If death is half this sweet, it's worth a good life.
Breathless at last, he pauses, hunching over his knees, exhaling purple, elated clouds. God, he loves the sound, the music in his soul, a dance his skin memorizes before his mind catches up. He's reaching for another world, though, his heart aching for the song even as he somersaults into that vortex.
6.
"Hmm."
"Whatsit?"
"Hmm."
"Hum-hum-hummus."
"Hmm."
Cisco blinks, tears in his eyes. He can still feel the song, even with the jungle underfoot, a warm tropical space thawing his still frigid limbs.
Before him, an atypically huge trio of crows sit on a branch, regarding him.
"Ravens," corrects the largest.
"Hmm," rejoins the middle-sized bird.
"Hummus," caws the smallest. "Hummus."
"I didn't say anything," Cisco says, stupidly. Canterbury Tales comes to mind.
"Cancer?" caws the largest.
"Hmm," rejoins the middle-sized bird.
"Hummus," corrects the smallest.
Cisco salutes and opens another portal.
7.
At first, he thinks it's another dark universe. Then his eyes adjust to the cavern's twilight, heart pounding when he sees a minotaur – an honest-to-god minotaur – lying on its side in the corner.
The minotaur snorts, a great explosive exhalation, and Cisco frantically hops through the portal before it can awaken.
8.
It's hot and humid and something enormous looms over him, rumbling rhythmically. A membranous shield blocks the sun, caging him in.
It's not dark, per se, but the tarp occludes his view, preventing him from taking in more than his immediate surroundings. Then the tarp shifts, accompanying a strangely deep warble right next to him, before the creature stands.
With a good-morning, ground-shaking hum, the Quetzalcoatlus shakes out its thirty-foot wings and cranes its head on a neck thrice as long as Cisco is tall to regard him with bright eyes. Its beak, menacingly sharp, hovers inches from his chest. Legs trembling, he swallows.
He's been to enough museums to know that Quetzalcoatli are carnivores.
The pterosaur yawns, exposing its teeth, and Cisco knows he will have nightmares for approximately Ever.
Before its jaws close, he jumps into a wormhole.
9.
The building's going up in flames around him. Fire presses in on all sides, his lungs straining for air in the inferno.
Dropping to his hands and knees, he tries to reorient, but the smoke is heavy and he wishes he had shoes and then there's a lightness he recognizes, a weightlessness he knows, before he's deposited gently on a curb in fresh, gorgeous air.
Heaving deep breaths, he stares after his rescuer, already gone, Flashing in and out of the building so fast he's barely visible, his passage only remarkable as the curbside population grows. EMTs crowd onto the scene; one asks him his name, if he's okay, gives him an oxygen mask, tells him they've got this under control.
Cisco thinks, Barry. He's gently pushing the EMT away, wobbling to his feet, refusing the mask, convinced of only one thing. Barry.
With a flourish, The Flash comes to a halt, tinged in soot but smiling triumphantly. "Got 'em," Wally West says, wearing Barry's suit.
For the first time in this whole misadventure, Cisco misses Barry so much his heart hurts.
He leaves before The Flash can lock eyes with him and ask why he looks disappointed.
10.
He tumbles into a bar, startling a few laughs from an already inebriated crowd, and it hits him that at least half of the crowd displays blatantly non-human traits: webbed hands, blue skin, and fur from shoulder to shin, among others. To say he doesn't stand out is an understatement, the human bartender exchanging pleasantries with a scruffy card-shuffling patron.
"Deal you in?" the card-carrier asks companionably.
Cisco thinks, Sure. But he shakes his head politely, says, "Gotta be somewhere," and walks out of the bar, disappearing in the night.
11.
Where is always questionable.
Cisco wonders if this is what it's like to travel in the Speed Force: never quite sure where or when you are, only that you're Somewhere, and sometimes Somewhere is enough.
Huddled on the streets in a cardboard box, he wishes Somewhere were warmer, that Somewhere didn't tint his cheeks with shame, that Somewhere had four walls and a roof over his head. But he has a blanket, and that's a lot. He has his health, and that's even more.
Breathing into his hands, he looks up slowly when someone drops a couple bills into a hat in front of himself. They keep their face tilted away, almost apologetic, almost shy, and Cisco stares as Caitlin vanishes into the crowd.
It's a twenty-dollar bill and a piece of paper. Homeless shelter, it reads, followed by an address. His heart hurts.
Shuffling to his feet – the mill of people conspicuously circumvents him to avoid direct contact – he finds a fellow huddler and drops the bill and note in their hat. As a final grace, he drops his body-warmed blanket around their shoulders. Then he walks through a dimensional door and enters a true homelessness that is still warmer than the streets.
12.
They're counting down – three! Two! One! – and then champagne bottles pop as the small group jumps up and down, whooping and welcoming the new year. Cisco catches a glimpse of the TV sprawled in the front of the room – 2039! – and blinks in surprise, oofing as he's swept up into a celebratory hug.
"Happy New Year!" someone shouts in his ear, spilling confetti on his hair, caught up in the festivities effortlessly.
He grins and blows on a noisemaker, hair getting ruffled by strangers, the energy perfectly symbiotic, give-and-take in equal measure. He adopts a pair of shoes that fit him reasonably well, hoping their true owner can forgive him eventually. When he slows enough to catch a glimpse of a familiar face, he can't help but stare.
It's Barry's kid. He is absolutely, one hundred percent sure of it – she has his smile, a big, goofy thing, but Iris' sweetness when she hugs him. She's pushing twenty, and Cisco feels something big and warm swelling in his chest at the sight of her. Then a big guy, her twin, appears, rubbing Cisco's head affectionately and shouting over the noise, "Didn't think you'd make it!"
Neither did I, Cisco muses, wondering what relationship he has with them – with all these kids, friends of the twins', kids of his colleagues, maybe – and he has a wild, irrational urge to find their parents.
"Don!" a voice calls. "Donatello!"
Barry's son turns, offering a final noogie for good luck before disappearing into the small crowd after the voice.
Barry named his kid after a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle. Cisco laughs, unable to help it. He looks at Barry's daughter and tries to place her name without asking, suspecting it would reveal a certain coup de grace to ask. "You okay?" Barry's daughter asks.
"I'm fine, Dar," rolls off Cisco's tongue. Dar.
In his mind, he sees it on the birth certificate: Dawn Rose West-Allen. DAR. He can almost see Barry's big teary-eyed smile and Iris' fond mixture of exasperation and pain medication tempered by the utter, utter love radiating from her as she cradles a twin in each arm.
"Why Don and Dawn?"
"Easy to remember."
"Dar," Iris interjects.
Barry blinks. "Dar," he repeats. He smiles slowly. "Dar."
Just as suddenly, it hits him like a ton of bricks: Barry's not coming.
"Where's your dad?" he makes the mistake of asking out loud, suddenly needing it not to be true, the heavy, painful, sinking feeling in his chest.
Dar's smile disappears. "Why would you ask that?" she asks quietly. Hurt.
"I—" Cisco shakes his head, feigning being momentarily caught up. "I'm sorry, I just – forget sometimes, y'know?" It hurts.
Dar's renewed smile hurts, too; it's just as fond if not as celebratory. "He'd be happy you're here with us," she says, squeezing his arm. "I mean, you've been here for everything else."
It warms him a little to know that much. "It's good to see you," he says truthfully.
She hugs him again, and he wonders if it's the joy of the night or if his baby-face really is that persistent that she doesn't see through his age-gap. "Good to see you, too, Cisco," she replies, leaving him to hug some friends.
He walks out of the room, into the hallway, and savors the celebration, a new year, another without Barry Allen, and steps through a portal into another one.
13.
Unlucky thirteen. The world where Cisco gets a front-row seat to the last place on Earth he wants to be – and the most necessary place for him to be.
Amid the rubble of an explosion, tankers overturned, crowd pressed back to a safer periphery blocks away, there's a speedster bleeding out in the streets. Cisco's legs are leaden as he runs towards him, ignoring the oil bleeding onto the streets, dangerously close to ignition. One spark could send the whole mess up in flames, and at ground zero there's Barry, covered in a pool of red, the warmth gushing from a deep wound in his hip. It spills sluggishly over his gloved fingers, soaking Cisco's hands in seconds as he falls to his knees next to Barry, pressing both hands over the wound like he can reverse the process.
"Hey, buddy, hey," he says, frantic, fearful, painfully aware of how little time he has. "Hey, hey, look at me, look at me, it's gonna be okay, I'm gonna get you to STAR, it's okay, you're okay, it's gonna be okay."
"Cisco," Barry slurs. "S'okay."
There are tears in Cisco's eyes as he puts his hands underneath Barry's arms and drags him as gently as he can from the pool of blood and gasoline. Barry still moans softly in discomfort, his legs dragging limply behind him. He's heavy and it's hard but Cisco doesn't care, doesn't acknowledge the tears misting his vision or the tremble in his hands as he finally pulls Barry clear of the puddle, pulling him into a dark alley and God this is such a terrible spot to die.
Barry was supposed to die heroically, not huddled in a forgotten corner of the Earth with nothing separating him from the grating pain in his legs, the tension in his face. He has Cisco, though, and Cisco says, "You're gonna be okay" and doesn't believe it for a second, crying over him and the suit that couldn't protect him, the suit that couldn't save him.
He has the horrible feeling that no one will find them, not for a while, that the Vanishes in Crisis headline is about to go viral. That Barry's life will be snuffed without a single candleholder to mourn him, taken like a star from the sky, one of too many to be seen. Cisco hugs him, abandoning the task of trying to stop the unstoppable flow of lifeblood from his leg, and Barry curls a cold hand in his shirt.
"'m so glad y're here," he mumbles against Cisco's shoulder. "'m so – 'm so – s-sorry. I didn'—" He shudders, and Cisco cups the back of his head, holding him like he can hold him to this world. "I don' want to die."
Cisco sobs, sobbing harder when Barry repeats it because I'm sorry, and he feels Barry's grip going slack and feverishly tries to revive him, giving him a little shake, hey, Bar, hey Bar, hey-Bar, until the weight in his arms goes dead.
He closes his eyes, breathing in deeply, strangling over it, and exhaling slowly. Covered in Barry's blood, he hugs him close like he needs to keep Barry warm, rocking them slowly, wake-up-wake-up-wake-up.
At last, shuddering, he pushes himself to his feet. Those golden eyes are closed, the human hazel finally burned out, and no warmth dances under his skin. For a moment, he can feel it around them, like a living shadow, flitting over his skin and erasing the blood.
Then it's gone, and Barry is too, and Cisco can't breathe for how much it hurts.
He wanders mindlessly into the street, calling in a voice that won't carry for help, help, please, somebody, and a stranger responds, and his voice breaks when he explains that The Flash is dead, that – he hiccups, unable to say Barry's name, unable to give away his secret even when it doesn't matter anymore – and the bystander attracts others, and the discovery is made hours ahead of time.
The Flash isn't missing.
The Flash is dead.
Running as fast as he can, Cisco runs away from it all.
14.
A big, heavy horse-snore beside him draws Cisco from a stable-dose, his back against a wooden wall as Demeter sleeps. He doesn't remember falling asleep, barely remembers stumbling into the stall and hugging the horse hard around her neck, what a good girl, and she stood still and let him sob against her for what felt like hours until he sank to the floor in stupefied misery, joining him in her perfectly responsive way.
Together, they slept away the pain, washing away the ash of the evening in moonlight stall-light, the soothing snuffle of nearby horses like a balm to Cisco's soul. He shifts his legs, sparking tingles down them, and hears Demeter whuff softly, a sleepy, questioning sound as she lifts her head to look at him. "Good girl," he tells her again, climbing creakily to his feet and patting her mane. "Good girl."
He wanders out of the stall, closing and locking it behind him, muttering it over and over, Good girl, good girl, because it's better than I'm sorry, it's safer than don't leave me.
Out in the paddock, he sees a familiar figure leaning against a fence, his shoulders easing slightly as he approaches the tall stable-hand. "Couldn't sleep?" Barry asks.
Cisco doesn't know nor care if their worlds collide in this way: he wraps his arms around Barry's back and presses his face against it, just to feel the living warmth, each gentle inhale and exhale of an utterly human, utterly ordinary heart. "Cisco?" Barry says. He turns and wraps his arms around Cisco in a proper hug, and he's not Speed-hot but he's warm, he's alive, and it's all Cisco can do not to bawl against him.
"Bad dream," he lies.
Barry rubs his back soothingly. "It's okay," he says.
Cisco dares to believe it might be, staying with Barry for as long as he will bear.
When sunlight creeps over the horizon, he follows Barry to the stalls, watching him wander with unmistakable ease, like twenty years of good sleep and good living. He knows this isn't a hero Barry, not in the grandiose sense, but there's something heroic about his manner regardless, a generosity of spirit that translates into a steady, genuine hand as he spends time with each of the horses, welcoming their assistants readily as they arrive for the morning shift.
It's a rehab center, Cisco realizes, for people with special needs, for people with battle scars, for people who could use the blind love a horse can offer. It doesn't surprise him that Demeter's a charmer with everyone, sweet and unpresumptuous, there but never forcing you to acknowledge her. Just standing nearby, a rock in a personal storm, and she doesn't need to speak the language to know what to say.
Sometimes nothing at all is the best thing that can be said.
Cisco wants to stay forever, but he craves a different reality more, craves it so much it aches in his heels and his teeth and his skin, and he considers tracking down Barry for one more hug and knows he won't ever let him go if he does.
He takes a deep breath, channels that hope and wholeness as much as he can, and steps through a portal.
15.
"Attention crew of the Enterprise," Ray Palmer says, voice ringing with authority, "we have had no further word from our reconnaissance team. First Officer West and Lieutenant Wells' final communique indicated a hostile reception; it is therefore our imperative to reestablish contact, recover the recon team, and, if possible, salvage the diplomatic hearings with the Dominators. Palmer out."
Cisco stares around the bridge, dazedly by the honest-to-god starship, a red-shirt eyeing him and pointing out, "Authorization?"
Ray turns his chair in Cisco's direction and grins. "Ramon. I thought you were still in the med bay. How's your head?"
Spinning. "Fine – sir," Cisco says, attaching the honorific after a pointed look from the same red-shirt as before. "What's this about the recon team?"
Ray frowns, shaking his head slowly, sinking into his seat. "You didn't hear. Iris and Jesse were taken hostage at 0400 hours."
Cisco swallows. "What's being done about it?" he asks. He itches to grab a blue-shirt, a red-shirt, hell, he'll take command-gold if it means people will stop staring at him. His Vibe gear is ostentatiously out of place here.
"We're working on that. As of right now, we're working on setting up an exchange for their safe return."
Cisco nods, looking at Ray – his bold, commandeering stance perfectly suited for the captain's chair – and saying, "I need to change."
Ray nods once, turning his attention back to the screen as one of the red-shirts says, "Sir, we have contact."
Much as he would like to stay and see the negotiation, Cisco's nerves propel him to the nearest elevator, opening a portal and stepping through before the first ping-ping-ping resonates through the ship.
Game on, he doesn't hear Captain Ray Palmer say with a wolfish smile.
16.
The air tastes like sulfur.
Cisco drags his shirt up over his mouth and nose, holding it there to block out the ash clouding the air, a distant, thunderous rumbling indicating a cataclysm he cannot see.
Around him, dinosaurs writhe and scream as sulfuric acid rains down on them, igniting forests and sending all but the most immovable organisms fleeing in terror.
No one notices him escape the extinction level event from under the dying shadows of T. rexes.
17.
It's That Night. Cisco knows it as surely as his own name.
There's already a version of himself at the command center, watching the particle accelerator go online at Dr. Wells' side, but this version – shaken, covered in soot, but still miraculously alive – walks away from STAR Labs. He walks to the precinct. Inside, he passes Joe. The lack of recognition there drives a knife into his gut; he ignores it, telling himself if all goes "according to plan," they'll know each other soon enough.
He takes the elevator to the sixth floor, stepping out and climbing the final staircase to the forensics' lab.
He hesitates at the door, one hand extended to knock. A crackle of thunder outside seems to slap him in the face, growling ominously. Don't interfere, it warns.
Inexplicably, he wants to, to tell Barry to run, to get away from here, to dive out of the crossfire before it changes him forever. Sure, he wants Barry to save people, to be the hero Cisco knows he can be, but he also wants Barry to be alive in 2038.
That won't happen, if all goes "according to plan."
There's another crackle of thunder, louder than the first, and the power goes out. Cisco's heart starts pounding.
C'mon, he tells himself, still hovering, agonizingly close. Do it.
A third crackle of thunder is so loud it startles Cisco back, almost tripping over his own feet as he reels. Adrenaline pouring through him, he shoves the door open without knocking, staring at the figure sprawled limply over the chemical rack, fingers still twitching feebly as they dangle from the table.
He scrambles into the portal before Singh's familiar footsteps can close the distance from the floor below, a strange mixture of guilt and relief settling in his stomach.
Is this how Barry felt when he didn't save his mom?
18.
He gets a chance to find out. Kind of.
Like a world six seasons ago, there's a substantial time difference. He knows it because he can see Barry and Iris sitting on swings at the park, not a day over eight. There's a warmth to their demeanors that belies innocence, that expresses nothing bad ever happened. And it's a lie – of course they've been visited with their share of bad experiences – but That Night hasn't happened, either.
Cisco keeps walking, not wanting to make a scene, a strange fuzzy warmth in his stomach at the thought that on this beautiful summer day, at least, all is well.
He rounds the corner, out of sight, out of mind, and walks into another world.
19.
When Cindy dropped Cisco God-knew-how-many-worlds away, his sole goal was to get back home. And sure, he met selkies and stable boys along the way, but it's Earth-19 that really strikes a chord with him.
Because Earth-19 is a mirror of home, with one notable exception.
Dante is alive.
He's just sitting there, playing the piano, and Cisco wants to knock on the door and mend the bridge now, to push it, to make the connection they'd both been craving for years happen prematurely, but the window is open – a gorgeous, warm summer day – and he can't help but just pause. Listen. And enjoy. Dante hasn't noticed him – he won't, unless he turns, and Cisco won't be there when he does. It's better that way.
Listening to him play, Cisco feels his shoulders relax. He really is a beautiful pianist. Taking a seat against the side of the house, he looks out at the sleepy street and imagines staying here, in this time when everything was simpler, when particle accelerator was scarcely a twinkle in Dr. Wells' – Eobard Thawne's – eye and he was just shy of his fourteenth birthday. Life was so much simpler here.
He likes that Dante messes up when he plays, has to start over at times, misses a note, slows down to get a chord right. He likes that he can just listen, doesn't have to provide feedback, doesn't have to listen to how great Dante is, how much he should be like Dante.
Being like Cisco suits him just damn fine.
He stays till the piano man pushes back from the keys, satisfied for one more day, and then he stands and finds a new road.
20.
He's getting warmer. He can feel it.
It's a season like summer, a golden warmth, a good vibe.
The beach stretches out in front of him for centuries, a sweet sunrise creeping over the horizon. The ocean ruffles his hair affectionately, welcoming him back, and it doesn't matter that he's still infinitely far from home: it tastes like home. It smells like home.
He doesn't turn when he hears footsteps behind him, approaching with care. Closing his eyes, he smiles when a pair of lanky arms sneaks around his waist, a friendly chin tucking over his shoulders.
"You're up early," Barry says, still sleep-husky and pajama-warm.
It's like the first time he wanted to kiss Barry, all rumpled in his stupid STAR Labs sweater (the only man in the honest-to-god world that could make a STAR Labs sweater look sexy, even if he simultaneously pulled off cuddly, too) and cranky with heat but still laughing lightly at his jokes and bantering back. They'd just hit it off so well, knowing how to read each other without asking, never needing introductions beyond the most preliminary.
"I didn't want to miss this," Cisco admits, resting a hand over Barry's arm, and he smiles when Barry kisses his cheek, tempted to turn into it, to give him what he wants.
But, he decides, gently refusing, he doesn't want to give an incomplete relationship his everything.
That's what his Barry is for.
But sunrise is worth sharing with this Barry.
When Barry leaves, giving him space, Cisco takes a deep breath and wanders off alone.
21.
They're seated at an award ceremony, and somehow, impossibly, there's a seat for him.
He slips into it as inconspicuously as he can, smiling at Iris and Barry, their hands intertwined, and glancing up at the stage expectantly. It hits him, suddenly, what this is for, and his heart pounds as the announcer says:
"It is my great privilege to present the Nobel Prize in Medicine to Dr. Caitlin Snow."
Decorum alone keeps him in his seat, but he's cheering as loudly as he dares, flushed with joy because holy fuck, Caitlin, and Barry reaches over and ruffles his hair fondly because you're such a nerd and it makes something warm in Cisco's chest even though he knows this Barry isn't his.
He's always yours, a small voice reminds, and it's true: even in this context, he's seated right next to Cisco.
He decides to test the theory once again, waiting just long enough to hug Caitlin hard before making his excuses and vanishing from their world.
22.
Statistically, this is the most probable: an utterly normal day.
Cisco walks into Jitters and orders a coffee he's never tried before, because new universe, new me. He buys and reads the paper, cover-to-cover, for two hours, just listening to people from a completely different dimension chat about their days, recollecting events that may never have happened on his Earth. He attempts the crossword puzzle and gives up after half an hour, ordering a second coffee he's never tried before and people-watching some morning.
"This seat taken?" a familiar voice asks.
Cisco can't wipe the stupid smile off his face. "Depends," he drawls, "who's asking?"
Barry rolls his eyes, sliding into the seat and kicking his ankle lightly in rebuke. There's a bruise fading on his cheek; Cisco hisses low in sympathy, reaching out unconsciously to touch it. "What—?"
"Right?" Barry agrees, missing the point, waving him off nonchalantly. "Singh wanted to know who beat me up. Said I should file a report."
Cisco rests a hand on Barry's arm. "Does it hurt?"
Barry lifts his eyebrows and steals Cisco's coffee, scrunching up his nose in surprise. "You changed your coffee order," he recuses.
"You didn't answer my question."
Barry sighs and passes the coffee back to him. "Not much," he concedes.
"I might have something at the Labs," Cisco begins, "that can help—"
"I have had far worse than shiners, Cisco," Barry reminds. Cisco hates that it's true. Barry sweeps his thumb across Cisco's skin, warm but not Speed-warm. "Everything okay? You're quiet."
Someone hurt you.
"Just digesting," he replies.
"Mm, that reminds me." Barry clambers up, fetching a proper coffee and a cronut for himself, letting Cisco steal bites without qualm. Something different; normally, he'd have finished it before Cisco could blink, moving onto the tenth by the time Cisco caught up.
But is it really normal for Barry to have Speed, if he doesn't in so many?
Cisco doesn't know. He tries not to let his distraction show, listening as intently as he can to Barry as he describes his latest run-in with a mugger who tried to steal Iris' purse at the particle accelerator launch, the asshole, and Cisco's heart skips a beat but then Barry says, "I mean, the swelling should go down in a few days, it was way worse last night—" and Cisco realizes that the accelerator didn't explode here.
He wonders – quietly, insatiably wonders – what Dr. Wells is like. If it's really, really him. If Eobard never ruined any of their lives.
He risks it: "What'd your parents have to say about it?"
"You know my mom," Barry says, "Dad thought it was fitting. Way to go, slugger." He punches Cisco lightly on the shoulder.
It doesn't escape Cisco's notice that in spite of everything, there's still a goddamn bruise on his face that doesn't belong there.
It also occurs to him that Barry shouldn't know who he is, that a domino tipped somewhere that he didn't follow because here, he couldn't have met Barry after a nine-month-long coma that never happened.
The universe wants to be bros.
Barry's phone goes off and he's up with an apologetic, "Hey, I'll see you later," squeeze to Cisco's arm, and Cisco lingers for a moment longer, curious, wanting to dig deeper and see what common interest pulled them together here, why he can't protect any Barry for more than a day, it seems, but then he realizes that he could spend the rest of his life searching here and never truly be satisfied.
Decided, he recycles his newspaper and moves on, escaping the mold.
23.
Someone fires a bullet near his head.
Cisco jerks, narrowly avoiding certain death, as a warbled voice says, "See, shouldn't have done that" and a second later the gun is dismantled and on the floor, the baddie responsible handcuffed for good measure. "You really thought you could beat The Flash? Really." It's Wally, in his own uniform this time, radiating authority and something approaching amusement. "Nice try." Turning to look at Cisco, all golden eyes and zero recognition, he adds, "Are you okay?"
Cisco looks around, taking in the alleyway, his spectacular timing, and the sheer improbability of being rescued by Kid Flash on another Earth, before nodding slowly.
"Awesome." Kid Flash sweeps his quarry up and disappears, leaving Cisco reeling in the streets.
Up and at 'em, he tells himself, climbing to his feet – still alive – and opening yet another portal.
24.
His first sense is, I know this place.
It sends a wave of relief down his shoulders when he looks around and recognizes Kara's apartment.
Speaking of Kara – "May I help you?" a man asks, crunching on a corn chip on the couch.
Cisco lifts a hand, automatically Vulcan saluting. "I come in peace," he says, wondering how convincing the whole act is with soot still hanging from the remains of his suit.
Thankfully, Kara emerges from an adjacent room, enthuses, "Cisco," and almost breaks a rib with the force of her hug. "What are you doing here? I mean, I'm thrilled to see you, but—"
"Long story short, there's an evil female version of me, who kidnapped me and dropped me off in a random universe," Cisco says, a little breathlessly from the force of her hug. "I've been trying to get home. Taking the scenic route."
"Need a hand?" Kara asks.
"So we know him?" the man on the couch chimes in, crunching on another chip.
"This is Barry's friend," Kara explains, stepping back.
"Ah."
"Cisco, this is Winn Schott," Kara introduces.
Winn holds up a mirroring Vulcan salute. "'Sup."
"If you need help getting home, I could give you a boost," Kara reiterates. "That's how Barry got back."
Cisco blinks, realizing there is a story there. One he needs to hear.
But from the man himself, he resolves.
"I think I can handle it," he admits, "but if I pop back into existence, then yes."
"Time travel is weird," Winn says.
"Dimension hopping, actually," Cisco corrects automatically. "They're – different."
"Dimension hopping is weird," Winn corrects, reminding Cisco of one of the three crows – ravens.
Hummus.
"Wish me luck," he says, accepting one more good-luck hug from Kara. "I'll come visit sometime, I just – need to get home. Caitlin and Barry are probably having a fit."
"Understandable." Kara steps back, giving him space. "Godspeed."
Cisco opens a portal and steps through it, crossing his fingers.
25.
It's STAR Labs.
But it's not his STAR Labs.
Dr. Harrison Wells pauses mid-dictation, turning off his recording device and looking at Cisco in unmistakable surprise. "Cisco," he says, "wasn't expecting you."
"Harry?"
Harry lifts both eyebrows. "Were you expecting someone else?"
Heart pounding – Earth-2, I'm on Earth-2 – he shakes his head. "It's a long story," he says. There are dinosaurs, he adds unconsciously. "You good?"
Harry frowns thoughtfully. "Yes."
"Awesome." Cisco shakes his arms out, suddenly jittery at the prospect of home – home. One universe away.
"Everything all right?"
"About to be," Cisco says, stepping into another world.
26.
Valiant, vigilant, fiercely loyal friends that they are, Caitlin and Barry are both sound asleep when Cisco steps into the cortex.
They look tired enough, Barry on his back on the floor and Caitlin curled up in a chair, that Cisco almost feels back for waking them. But his borrowed shoes hit the floor and Barry bolts upright, zipping around the cortex in a blur of yellow before coming to an abrupt halt in front of him, hugging him so hard it hurts.
"Oh, you're okay, you're okay, thank God," he murmurs, all but nuzzling Cisco's shoulder with relief, stupid with sleep but still refreshingly, earnestly himself.
"I'm okay," Cisco says, smiling and wiggling an arm free so he can hug Caitlin when she saunters over to join the circle. "I'm okay."
"We get Cindy in the pipeline," Barry announces, yawning against his shoulder. "The nice version is back on Earth-19, telling the council that she killed HR. She didn't know you were taken by a doppelganger."
It seems almost funny that nice version is accompanied by killed HR, but he has Caitlin and Barry on either side of him and has never felt more at home.
"I missed you," he tells them both, seriously, desperately, like he'll never get to say it again and please, please don't take it away from him.
But Barry holds onto him, and Caitlin does too, and Barry says, "We missed you, too," he means it fully.
And this – this is home. This is where he belongs.
"What happened?" Barry dares to ask, after a little infinity that lulls Cisco into sleepy acceptance of their group hug, craving his Speed-heat, so familiar and so strange, so utterly unique at the same time. He smells like Barry – like a whiff of horses, like copper, like confetti, like champagne, like too many worlds.
Cisco presses his forehead against Barry's shoulder, savoring the strength in his grip. "A lot," he admits. Too much to tell you, he adds silently.
Caitlin doesn't push, squeezing his shoulder lightly as she pulls back. "We should get some rest," she says, failing to suppress a yawn.
Barry catches it, yawning, too, and doesn't let go of Cisco. "Okay," he agrees.
Cisco hugs him, willing him to hold on for approximately Forever. "Okay," he echoes.
And somehow, he knows, it finally, finally is.